Aside from being human, one of the most interesting things that Mormons, Muslims, Atheists, Gays and Lesbians have in common is that a substantial number of voters are biased against voting for members of these socially constructed groups for President of the United States. A recent Gallup Poll and a journal article that is being published in Electoral Studies and discussed in Vanderbilt University’s “Research News” present data and analysis on this issue.
The Gallup Poll covering the period June 9-12, 2011, shows an unwillingness to vote for people with the following characteristics as President: Mormon, 22%; Gay or Lesbian, 32%; and Atheist, 49%. These religions and sexual orientations have substantially higher negatives than other groups tested by Gallop: Hispanics, 10%; Jews, 9%; Baptists, 7%; Catholics, 7%; women, 6%; and Blacks, 5%. Obviously, people can belong to one or more classifications, but the meaning of the survey is clear.
Gallop points out that the bias against Mormons has remained consistently high over decades while there have been steep declines in other categories. Resistance to a Mormon President shows that the largest differences are among different educational groups: college graduates, 12%; some college, 20%; and no college, 31%. Significant differences on Mormons for President were not correlated with gender, age, or religion. Republicans and independents demonstrated less reluctance than Democrats. Those from the East showed less bias towards a Mormon candidate than those in other parts of the country, especially the Midwest. These findings may pose a hurdle for Republican Presidential primary candidates Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman.
The data and analysis presented in the Electoral Studies journal article by Brett V. Benson, Jennifer L. Merolla and John G. Geer, “Two Steps Forward and One Step Back? Bias in 2008 Presidential Election” makes a number of interesting observations concerning religious bias. The data came from two Internet-based experiments run by Polimetrix in November 2007 and October 2008. John Geer, a political scientist at Vanderbilt observed:
“Our data showed that the voters’ increased social contact with Mormons reduces bias among the general population. However, this does not seem to be the case for Southern Evangelicals since religious threat is particularly relevant for this group. In other words, social contact does not diminish bias when the religious conflict from a given group is salient in politics.”
This doesn’t mean that a Mormon can’t be elected President, but it does point out a hurdle that Romney and Huntsman would have to overcome if selected by their party. The data showed even greater challenges atheists and Muslims in winning support from Southern Evangelicals.
Worldwide membership in the Mormon religion is approximately 14 million people. The Mormon Church has a website which provides easily accessible information about their faith for anyone who would like to understand their religion. Opposition by Southern Evangelicals to Mormons appears to me to be based more upon theological differences than conflicts on cultural values. These conflicts are difficult to resolve because they are based upon ideological beliefs rather than factual truths; and many of these beliefs are held by what Eric Hoffer termed true believers in his 1951 book on mass movements. In addition to true believers, the situation is compounded by what Herbert H. Hyman and Paul B. Sheatsley termed a hard core of “know nothings” in their classic 1947 study. The abstract for “Some Reasons Why Information Campaigns Fail” reads as follows:
“’Even if all the physical barriers to communication were known and removed,’ the authors contend, ‘there would remain many psychological barriers to the free flow of ideas.’ For example, interested people acquire more information than the uninterested; people seek the sort of facts which are congenial to their existing attitudes; different groups interpret the same information differently. This study is based on an analysis of national samples of the American people.”
In addition to “true believers” and “know-nothings,” it is equally difficult to correct flawed misinformation held by “know-somethings.”
For me, the terms “true believers” and a hard core of “know-nothings” capture important aspects of the why it so difficult to reduce bias. While increased social contact is important, other interventions are necessary which address representations, institutions, routinized social actions, the legitimation of them, and the processes by which they are passed on to others and internalized.
People with biases are probably more willing to admit they would not vote for a Mormon that to admit they are biased against women, blacks, hispanics, or Jews. It is not kosher to be openly racist anymore, but that doesn’t imply people would actually vote for a member of those groups. On the other hand someone may be willing to state they would not vote for a Mormon without even having a deep prejudice, so the barrier may be smaller than the poll suggests.
The poll must have a large error, which is not captured by the usual statistics. I wouldn’t put too much trust in the results.
Gallop includes its methodology and confidence limits in a link at the end of the study. The link for the study is http://www.gallup.com/poll/148100/hesitant-support-mormon-2012.aspx. Gallop states, “Results are based on telephone interviews conducted June 9-12, 2011 with a random sample of –1,020—adults, aged 18+, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the margin of error is ±4 percentage points. For results based on the sample of –524—national adults in Form A and –496—national adults in Form B, the maximum margins of sampling error are ±5 percentage points. For results based on the sample of –914— registered voters, the maximum margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points.” Also included are some other data sorts and trend data. The trends over time are extremely interesting to me. What caught my attention was that some of the Gallop Poll Data is consistent with the Internet experiment data that was used as a basis for the journal article. I’m sure that there are many alternative interpretations of the data and explanations that might be plausible.
It is possible that bias toward these groups is even more significant than the numbers suggest, as people often under represent points of view that might be judged negatively by others against social and cultural norms. For me, the causal question is the interesting one. In this case, I wonder about what is causing in the sample population such a significant unwillingness to vote for a Mormon president, especially considered against other characteristics.
I suspect that you are correct about the magnitude of bias. As for causation, I suspect that there may be multiple factors. Perhaps they have already been identified in the research. There are a few clues about the variables. One of them deals with the conflict of two religions which have characteristics associated with true believers. In a story dated June 21, 2007 in the Baptist Press there were comments about concerns that evangelicals had about voting for a Mormon as president. R. Philip Roberts stated during the International Society of Christian Apologetics’ annual meeting that he was concerned about what he described as the Mormon claim of being the only true Christian Church. He also commented,
“As believers and followers of Jesus Christ, a candidate’s spiritual values are not the only criteria, by any means, for public office, but as voters, exercising our rights as citizens, to ignore altogether candidates’ religious perspectives would be potentially unwise, irresponsible and possible disloyal to our allegiance to Jesus Christ, Lord of lords and King of kings.”
I’m sure that there are other types of true believers which may also have beliefs which conflict with positions of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I also suspect that among these groups are hard cores of know-nothings.
Compounding this situation are the large numbers of less than flattering myths and urban legends about Mormons. This type of misinformation is consistent with other types of bias situations. I’m not sure what a though examination of the treatment of Mormons looks like in the popular media. I suspect that a number of studies have been done on this.
This just scratches the surface.
what will a evangelical choose in november? a morman or a black?
And what were the results, exactly? A liberal landslide based not on religion but on attitudes, a few o policies, and a handful closing their eyes and skipping to ballot questions. Why, indeed, would a poor person vote for a plutocrat? or a homosexual vote for a guy who thinks he’s better because he likes girls? I’m a good example. I’ll vote for anybody who has no organized religion, not huge campaign bunkers, no snooty memberships …. Hell, I’d vote for a bum or a bag lady if he agrees with me. Actually, I did — and just look what we got! Spenders, not savers.